


Public Welfare and Public Utility Service 


Bulletin No. 5 


THE UTILITY INDUSTRY 


_Its Relation to the Prosperity, Convenience and 
Happiness of Every Citizen 


A Series of Papers Prepared by Students of the School 
of Journalism, University of Illinois, 
upon the Subject 


“The Dependency of Communities upon the Utilities for Prosperity” 


For Use of Debating Clubs, Oral English 


and Current Topic Classes 


Issued 192] By 
ILLINOIS COMMITTEE on PUBLIC UTILITY INFORMATION 
203 South Dearborn Street, Chicago, Illinois 


= 


Introductory 


The marvelous development in the uses of electricity and gas and in means of communi- 
cation and transportation has rightfully led to the characterization of the public utility in- 
dustry of the nation as “the wonder industry of the twentieth century.” 


There is no man, woman or child in the nation who does not now, directly or indirectly, 
every moment of his or her life, receive benefits from these marvelous agencies. Whether 
we be awake or asleep these great public benefits are tirelessly at work providing for our con- 
venience, happiness and prosperity and day by day, as our civilization grows and our stand- 
ard of living becomes higher, their relationship to us becomes more and more intimate. 


In the schools today are those who must only a short time in the future step into the places 
of the great inventors, developers and pioneers who in the last half century have given Ameri- 
ca these wonder works. There are countless others who will be in other occupations, but who 
will be thrifty and save and invest of their savings in this great industry so that the money 
may be available for its progress and development in the interest of all the people — rich and 
poor. All of those now in the schools will be patrons of these services—that is unavoidable 
unless there should be a wish to go back to the primitive ways of living. 


It is because of this intense interest that today in the schools the pupils study so seriously 
the methods of production of the utility services; their history, the uses to which they are being 
put; their relationship to happiness and prosperity and attempt to fit themselves to become 
a part of this great industry which is so fundamental to the nation’s life. 


Students of the School of Journalism, University of Illinois, recently participated in a 
prize paper contest, the topic being ‘‘The Dependency of Communities Upon The Utilities For 
Prosperity”. These young journalists delved into their assignment from many angles and de- 
veloped many interesting facts. The judges of the contest consisted of three prominent news- 
paper men, who based their findings as to the better papers on (1) Accuracy of facts; (2) 
Method of handling assignment—style, etc.; (3) Cleanliness of copy and proper use of Eng- 
lish. Seven of the stories picked by the judges as being among the best are printed in this 
set which is the fifth of the series the Illinois Committee on Public Utility Information is 
publishing. 


How To Use This Bulletin: 


Debating: Many topics are sugested for formal or informal debating. , 

(1)—Resolved: That present civilization could not exist without electric, gas, transpor- 
tation and communication services. 

(2)—Resolved: That Communities should give every encouragement to those who are de- 
veloping the public service facilities of the nation. 

(3)—Resolved: That the prosperity of the utility industry is fundamental to the growth of 
every community. 


Rhetoric, Oral English, and Current Topic Classes: 
(1)—Make a three minute review of any of the papers contained in this bulletin. 
(2)—The value of utility service to the community. 


(3)—-What would happen to the values of all property if the utilities suspended opera- 
tion. 


For Additional Bulletins Please Address: 


Illinois Committee on Public Utility Information 


203 South Dearborn Street 
CHICAGO, ILL. 


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‘With a wave of her magic wand, the fairy god- 
mother changed the pumpkin into a golden carriage and 
Cinderella, in her beautiful new clothes, rode off to 


aot ball at the King’s palace.” 


The story of Cinderella is not new to us — most 
of us grew up hearing it over and over, just as we 
have grown up with electric lights and running wate, 
And, like Cin- 
derella, we do not realize until the clock strikes the 
midnight hour, or something happens to our conve- 
niences, just how much we have prospered since our 
fairy godmother, the public utilities, came into our 
lives and bestowed favors. The drudgery of the kitch- 
en work is over, the darkness of the nighis with only 
a dying fire for light, have passed for us as well as 
for the scullery maid in the fairy tale. 


Public utilities, as we understand the term, sup- 
ply gas, water, electricity, heat and transportation, and 
also provide means of communication by telephone 
and telegraph, carry our household commodities as 
freight, express or baggage, store our valuables in 
ware-houses and our grain and food in elevators. It 
is very evident that present day life requires and can- 
not exist without the service and products of these 
great enterprises organized for the public’s benefit. 


COMMUNITIES Just how much communi- 
DEPENDENT ON ties depend on these utilities 
UTILITIES for prosperity.is shown in the 


case of towns which have been 
deprived of their services. Householders in Galena, 
for example, look with dismay at their gas stoves, 
heaters and other gas-using utensils. And they look 
with more dismay at their bills for coal stoves, oil 
lamps and such fixtures. All this came because the 
gas company, which had served Galena, the oldest 
city in the state, for seventy years, failed them when 
the rates were placed so low that a fair return could 
not be earned upon the investment. Business men of 
that city say that it is the most serious calamity that 
has ever befallen Galena, and everyone will feel the 
effect in the way of depreciated property values. And 
think of the inconvenience of it. 


Illinois is an agricultural state much like South 
Dakota, where a survey of four counties was recently 
made, which revealed the pressing need of man-made 
power, instead of man-power. In sixty-one per cent 
of the farms, water had to be carried an average dis- 
tance of seventy-two feet, and on one farm, the wa- 
ter supply was half a mile away. Women worked fif- 
teen hours a day in summer and twelve in winter. No 
modern conveniences, such as running water, gas 
stoves or electric washing machines lighten the drudg- 
ery of their lives. Only nine farms had bath tubs, but 
eighty per cent had “tin Lizzies.” Nearly everyone 
used oil lamps for light and wood stoves for heat. 
What would a survey of Illinois farms show? Prob- 
ably, in most cases, the same dreary picture. 


The Utilities and Cinderella 


By Miss Mary C. Funk, Bloomington, III. 


THE PUBLIC Public utilities are truly 
OWNS THE public. Next to government 
UTILITIES bonds, securities of the Public 


Service Companies are more 
widely owned than any other class of investment. 
People in every walk of life own them, — the “butcher, 
the baker and candle-stick maker” as well as “doctor, 
lawyer, merchant, chief.” Among the owners are 
many women, trust funds, hospitals, lodges, colleges 
and churches. The man who carries a life insurance 
policy in an old-line company has an interest in pub- 
lic utility securities, because practically all old-line com- 
panies own them. People are interested when and 
where their savings are invested, in this case in utili- 
ties, and are anxious for them to be successful and 
prosperous. 

Prosperity is strictly an economic term. A com- 
munity or a state, like an individual, is prosperous 
when it is doing well, when there is plenty of business 
conducted with a profit for those engaged in it. 

Even before the days of public utilities, there 
were prosperous communities and individuals. A 
cave-man, in pre-historic days, may have been a per- 
son of importance with many flint axes, or an Indian 
a “heap big chief’? with many ponies and much corn. 
Chicago “boomed”? when extensive lake traffic began; 
the opening of the coal fields brought wealth to the 
southern part of Illinois. 


PROSPERITY All prosperity depends on 
HINGES ON CON. the exchange of goods or com- 
TINUED SERVICES modities, and involves preduc- 

tion and distribution, or sales. 
A community which by accident, design or misfor- 
tune is poorly served by any of the public service 
corporations, is a community which necessarily is be- 
hind in its material development and endures a conse- 
quent loss of material advancement with attendant in- 
convenience and dissatisfaction. 

The instant pure water ceases to flow through a 
city, death comes. If the great electrical plants should 
close, because of a coal shortage, for example, not only 
would the lights go out, but the machines in facto- 
ries would “go dead.’”’ Confusion would follow dead 
telephone wires; disorder and panic would result from 
the stopping of street cares and means of transpor- 
tation. All that is necessary for the support of the 
people and the maintenance of order would be at a 
stand-still. 

Public utility services are no longer a luxury en- 
joyed by the few. They have tong since been an urgent 
necessity of practically all urban residents and are 
rapidly being extended to meet the demands and needs 
of the rural community. For a few cents, the individ- 
ual has at his or her disposal properties worth millions 
of dollars. For the simplest short telephone chat be- 
tween neighbors, hundreds of dollars worth of property 
is used. 

Public utilities become factors in the general 
prosperity of the people to the extent that their 
standards of living and lives are affected by the use of 
the public utility facilities, for what promotes the con- 
venience and prosperity of the individual, contributes 
to the prosperity of society, generally. 


Public Utilities; Their Nature and Functions 


By Edward P. Leonard, LaGrange, III. 


Fostered because necessary, public utilities have 
emerged almost overnight, as the most astounding 
social reality of the past fifty years. 

Despite the view of some that the phrase is a big 
name which stands for a huge octopus, public utilities 
in reality are merely the unifying agency between 
man and the forces of nature. People need water 
and lighting facilities; they require telephone, tele- 
graph and power service; and they must have a means 
of transportation. Hence the introduction and evolu- 
tion of the so-called public utilities. 


MODERN LIFE Public utilities have at their 


IMPOSSIBLE foundation the mutual advantages 
WITHOUT which accrue through the delega- 
UTILITIES tion of various duties and respon- 


sibilities upon certain individuals. 
In earliest biblical times we find evidence of such dele- 
gated authority and the conclusion is inevitable that 
such was the origin of the present system. The prin- 
cipal mission of these selected individuals was better 
supervision, direction and regulation of community 
affairs for mutual and public benefit. The chieftain 
would gather his council of advisors around him and in 
this grouping we see tentatively represented the full 
organization of the modern public utility. 


Present-day life is dependent upon the mainten- 
ance and the continuance of the public utility system. 
Without the thousands of utility organizations civil- 
ization would be stagnant. 


Imagine everyone of us tilling the soil for our 
own food; pumping our water from wells; lighting 
our homes at night with candles or with kerosene; 
weaving our own clothes; all articles. for our own 
existence being produced by ourselves. At what stage 
of the civilizing process would we be under such condi- 
tions? We would be back in the primitive days of the 
wilderness which little knew the future progress. In- 
stead we work together, and thereby for each other; 
and by dividing the work centralize our efforts—thus 
improving our existence and reaping benefits other- 
wise unattainable. 


400,000 OWNERS, There are 400,000 sepa- 
193,000 EMPLOYES, rate owners of the _ public 
800,000 DEPENDENTS utilities securities in Illinois. 
IN ILLINOIS These companies have 1983,- 
000 employes. The estimation that 600,000 others are 
dependent upon these workers means that probably 
800,000 persons in the state are getting their liveli- 
hood directly from the work attendant with the pro- 
duction of these services; while another group of em- 
ployes whose labor is dependent upon the materials 
and supplies purchased by these companies brings the 
total number of persons-financially interested in public 
utilities up to 2,000,000. The wages alone of the work- 
ers employed in the utility industry amount to more 
than $230,000,000 annually. 

Illinois possesses 90 electric railway companies with 
38,841 miles of tracks, representing an approximate in- 
vestment of $456,200,000. These railways in Illinois 
carry more than two billion car riders every year. 
Chicago, alone, has enough electric railway tracks to 
stretch from Lake Michigan to the City of New York 
and out into the Atlantic Ocean 400 miles. 

Illinois now has more than 500 separate tele- 
phone companies owned by about 80,000 security 
holders, the majority of them residents of the com- 
munities where the companies give service. Over 


1,200,000 telephones are in use, or about one to each 
five inhabitants. As for Chicago, it alone numbers 
more telephones within the .city confines than the 
total number used in the combined countries of Eng- 
land, France, Italy, Spain, Greece, Portugal and Nor- 
way. Chicago daily handles an average of 3,000,000 
messages. 


These facts indicate the 
amazing necessity of public util- 
ities in the prevalent social life 
among the communities of the 
state for continued prosperity. 
It is an appalling thought to imagine the state sud- 
denly cut off from these services. Think of the ¢com- 
munity within the state denied the means of transpor- 
tation and communication. It would be more isolated 
and remote than a county in Borneo. If businéss were 
denied the use of power and telephone service the 
opinion is inevitable that everything would come to 
a halt. 


Greater in social import, imagine each home with- 
in the community denied the use of light and water 
services, to say nothing of telephone service. Some- 
thing like an acual test was afforded by the short 
suspension of street car facilities some months ago in 
Boston, Denver and Chicago which cities lost 50 per 
cent of their trade and 75 per cent of their labor and 
wages at those times. 


COMMUNITIES 
WOULD BE ISO- 
LATED WITHOUT 
UTILITIES 


In general, the greater the undertaking of the 
public utility, the greater the benefit to the consuming 
public. By acquiring efficiency of production the pub- 
lic utility is enabled to offer commodities of a better 
grade and lower cost to the communities in which these 
services are diffused. The public reaps the benefit of 
cooperative organization. 


COMPANIES The greater the public sup- 
MUST BE port the greater the _ service 
PROSPEROUS which a utility is enabled to ren- 


He der. A financially impoverished 
utility cannot serve the public satisfactorily. The pub- 
lic utility business is not shrouded in mystery. Its 
principal problem is the problem of any commercial 
enterprise. Its product must be sold at a price which 
shows a margin over costs and it must continuously 
expand its facilities to meet the growth of the com- 
munity served. 


SERVE PUBLIC 


Public utilities dealing in 
DIRECT FROM 


transportation, water, gas, elec- 


PRODUCER tricity, telephone and telegraph 
TO services are practically the only 
CONSUMER agencies which serve commun- 


ities directly from producer to 
consumer with no middleman. The gas plant is stationed 
at one end with a direct connection with your burner; 
the water works at one end with direct connection with 
your faucet; there is direct contact from your electric 
light or motor to the power house; the receiver and 
transmitter of your telephone connects you direct with 
the world. 


Since they will be the first to reap the benefits 
inherent in great public undertakings, the people must 
encourage, foster and support the public utilities, giv- 
ing them every opportunity to develop so that the 
prosperity and happiness of the people may be ‘en- 
hanced.. The one fetish, the sole aim and purpose, the 
single ideal and ambition of the public utility is reflect- 
ed in a single word—service. sy 


Alladin’s Lamp Outdone 


By George V. Buchanan, Jr., South Norwalk, Conn. 


Aladdin pulled down the cuff of his shirt and gave 
the magic lamp a brisk polishing—and the genii tow- 


ered before him. “Let there be light, and fetch me . 


a thousand slaves,” said Aladdin, and lo! there was 
light and a thousand slaves waited upon him. 


But Aladdin wasn’t so lucky after all. He just 
happened to be a bit more fortunate than his contempo- 
raries. Now-a-days he’d consider it an inconvenience 
to have to rub the lamp each time he wanted service, 
knowing that Mr. Jones, next door, was getting the 
same service by merely pushing a button, turning on a 
tappet, or some other such simple movement of the 
hand. 


ALADDIN’S Fantastic and breath-taking 
MAGIC as are the Arabian Nights sto- 
SURPASSED ries, they have a modern like- 


ness in our every-day life— 
thanks to the public utility corporations. Every day 
we make use of scientific wonders, and we treat them 
as matters of course, coming from—we don’t know 
where, nor do we care particularly. We do much as 
Aladdin did—take what we get, and treat it as a thing 
to be expected, after the novelty wears off. Yet they 
are of a nature so wondrous that were Aladdin to see 
them in operation today he would cast aside the lamp 
—considering it outclassed. : 

We turn a faucet and water gushes forth, hot or 
‘cold, in an amount that a dozen slaves could not carry, 
and it continues to flow until the simple turning of 
the faucet bids it cease. We push a button and a flood 
of light fills the room. By the same process we obtain 
electric energy that saves hours of hard and tiring 
labor. Instead of flying over Bagdad on a magic 
carpet we are rushed to all parts of the world by 
fast trains or by great ocean liners equipped with 
every comfort of our homes. 


Our modern day magic is produced by the public 
utilities. They furnish us with light, power, heat, 
transportation, water and communication. Their cost 
is practically negligible as compared with other living 
costs. During the war period, when all prices went 
soaring, utility rates were the last to advance and then 
in much less degree than any other prices. 


Utility services are of comparatively recent origin. 
‘The telephone, for instance, was invented in 1876 
but was not put into general use until as late as 1896. 


In the duo-decade intervening the telephone spread its 
valuable services slowly, beginning with a small ex- 
change in Bridgeport, Conn., three years after the in- 
ventiun. Since 1896, however, 35,000,000 miles of 
telephone wire have been stretched between homes 
and business houses all over the United States. The 
first successful electric railway began operations in 
1888 and the carbon lamp was invented in 1879. 


PLAY BIG All prosperity depends 
PART IN upon the exchange of goods or 
DISTRIBUTION commodities. It involves pro- 


duction and _ distribution or 
sales. In this production the utilities play a big part 
through furnishing economical power, heat, commun- 
ication and transportation. 


; The most simply equipped modern office building 
is absolutely dependent upon the utilities. The mod- 
ern home would be maintained only with the utmost 
difficulty were it not for their services. Light, heat, 
water and fuel problems are solved by these agencies. 


The disadvantages of regulation by municipalities 
of public utilities would be proven graphically in the 
event of a weak administration, a non-business admin- 
istration or one that is ‘‘controlled.’”’ Schools could be 
closed for some time, courts dispensed with and it is 
possible that even fire and police protection could be 
done away with temporarily but the instant pure water 
ceases to flow, the sexton begins to work over-time. 
If electricity fails not only will lights go out, but 
machines and factories would cease operation, elevat- 
ors would stop and men and women would be deprived 
of work which is life to them, and life and order to 
the city. 


If street cars did not move the city would be- 
come stagnant. Confusion would reign if the tele- 
phone went “dead.” 


The modern community is dependent on water, 
gas, electricity, street railways, telephones and other 
public utilities. All stand through every minute of the 
year ready to serve and at very low wages; all of them 
for less than the man of the house spends on cigars, 
or the family for movies or for gasoline. 

__ Without them we would be worse than Aladdin 
without his lamp so it is necessary that we protect 
them. We cannot afford to experiment with them. 
For, once they cease—then Aladdin would indeed have 
it “on” the modern, who, having the wonderful lamp, 
would have rubbed off its magic gloss and made it 
worse than useless. 





Public Utilities-Pioneers of Advancing Civilization 


By David Newton Jamison, Burlington, Ia. 


Throughout the ages, civilization and social prog- 
ress can be traced directly to improvements upon 
three essential factors of human society—the rapidity 
of communication between communities, the degree 
of comfort in the average home, and the ease and 
speed of transportation from one community to an- 
‘other. 

Progress was slow and halting in the time of the 
ancients and during the middle ages, because commu- 
‘nication was dependent upon the tedious process of 
sending letters by special hired messengers,—transpor- 


tation was dependent upon slow-moving, irregular sail- 
ing vessels and caravans, while the home was a rude 
hut or a chilly, damp and gloomy castle. Today, prog- 
ress is bounding forward at a constantly accelerated 
and breath-taking speed, due to the enormous develop- 
ment which modern inventions have brought to these 
three essential factors. These improvements, which 
have become vital now to modern advancement and 
comfort are known as public utilities, and include the 
telephone, the electric street railway, gas and electri- 
city, water, power and heat. ins 


TELEPHONE 


One of the most romantic 

ELIMINATES as well as auspicious moments 
DISTANCE of human history took place 
, when the first telephone was in- 

stalled. The telephone has eliminated distance, and 


brought the entire world within the beck and call of 
everyone. Whether Mr. Common Citizen wishes to 
chat with his neighbor next-door, or with his business 
associate in the next state, he need not leave his own 
living-room. He may avert death in his family by 
getting immediate contact with a physician at a time 
of stress. He may be in San Francisco and talk to 
his friends in New York. He may save hundreds or 
even thousands of dollars in a business deal by being 
able to make rapid communication over the telephone. 
In countless ways, this public utility alone saves daily 
a prodigious total in time and money. 


There were 11,716,520 telephones and 21,175 
public exchanges in use in the United States during 
1917. The industry gave employment to 262,629 per- 
sons, who, with the families dependent upon their earn- 
ings for support, aggregated over 1,000,000 persons. 
The plant and equipment cost $1,492,329,015,—repre- 
senting the investment of savings of more than 900,000 
thrifty Americans. And since 1917, more than 750,- 
000 telephones per year have been installed. 


It is significant to note that Illinois, one of the 
leading and most progressive states in the Union, has 
more telephones than are to be found in the entire con- 
tinents of Asia, Africa, and South America,—or more 
than there are in England, France, Italy, Spain, Greece 
Portugal and Norway combined. 


Even more impressive figures could be produced 
for some of the other public service utilities. It is 
known that the total amount of gas sold in the United 
States has shown an average annual increase since 
1908 of approximately 13 per cent, the rate of annual 
increase being greater in 1919 than in any preceding 
year. The gas and electric companies of Illinois daily 
serve practically 6,000,000 persons. The street and 


electric railways of ‘the state carry every year more 
than 2,000,000,000 passengers,—a total which is more 
than equal to the total population of the United States 
plus that of the entire British Empire, including India, 
Canada, Australia, plus that of France and all her col- 
onies, all the rest of Europe, the vast Russian Empire 
and all the teeming millions of China and Japan. 


RICH AND POOR 
SERVED ALIKE 
BY UTILITIES 


The public utilities are, in 
reality, the most democratic of 
commercial institutions. Pa- 
trons are of all conditions and 
all classes in the human scale. They are served with 
more uniformity and less discrimination by gas, street 
railway, electric, telephone and water companies than 
by any other business. The widowed washer-woman is 
supplied with gas of the same heating value as that 
delivered the wife of the banker who employs her, 
and both pay the same rate; electricity of equal voltage 
and price is delivered to mansion and cottage; all fares 
look alike to the street car conductor; the telephone 
operator responds with equal celerity to the voice of 
the clergyman or the bartender. 


Not only in service but in business opportunity 
are the utilities democratic. Any citizen may invest— 
frequently he is solicited to put his savings into the 
progressive service features of modern society. The 
present capitalization of public utility companies of the 
nation is estimated at more than $15,000,000,000, 
and the dividends as well as the service are open to all 
citizens. 


Let any one consider what his home life, his 
pleasures or his business would be like if there were 
no public utilities. What would be left of modern 
life, in city or in the country alike, after one had de- 
ducted the telephone, the electric light, electric power 
from industry, electric household devices, heat, gas, 
the street-car, the telephone and interurban? Not only 
is future progress and prosperity but also the mainten- 
ape ee present conditions dependent upon the public 
utilities. 


What The Utilities Mean To Every Family 


By Laura Eleanor Smith, Urbana, III. 


Did you ever stop to think what you would do 
if all public utility service was taken from you, sud- 
denly; if your electricity, gas, water, telephone, tele- 
graph and street railway services were all removed 
from your reach? 


Let us take just the common, every-day sort of 


citizen, Mr. N. E. One, who lives in a suburb of 


Chicago, and see what his life would be for a few 
hours, without public utilities. 


Mr. One gets up at 6:45, Mrs. One stirs a little, 
then says: “Norm, dear, when you turn that light on, 
will you please put a piece of paper around this side 
of it, so the light won’t shine in my eyes?” 


“Norm, dear” replies that he will be most pleased 
to do so. He gets to the light button, by falling over 
a chair which was not in its usual place, and pushes 
it. ‘“What’s the matter with this fool light?” he 
somewhat disturbedly inquires of the now wide- 
awake Mrs. One. “It won’t turn on! Guess its burnt 
out.” He shuffles to the window and slams it down. 
“Good heavens, Louise, but it’s cold in this room! 
I’ll get dressed and get a new fuse from the basement, 
for that light.”” He goes to the bath-room and punches 
the button. No light. Now rather angry, he feels his 
way to the basin and turns on the faucet. No water! 


He tries the cold faucet. Ditto there. Bath-tub, same 
way. He hurries back to the bed-room. 

“Louise, there’s something wrong with the water 
supply. The faucets won’t turn it on. What on earth 
do you suppose can have happened? I can’t shave and 
my face feels like a wire hair-brush. And the light 
doesn’t light in there either, so I guess it’s burnt out 
on this whole floor.” 


HOUSEHOLD He dresses clumsily and 
DEMORALIZED stumbles down-stairs to the low- 
BY FAILURE er floor. After trying the lights 


OF UTILITIES there and in the basement, he 
becomes thoroughly alarmed. 
He hurries up-stairs. “Louise, something dreadful has 
happened, the lights are off all over the house. There 
are no street lights either.” 

“Oh, Norm! I wonder if Billy and Ned are all 
right! Go right in there, please and see. Oh, this 
worries me!”’ 

Norm returns and reports that Billy is tossing a 
little restlessly but that both he and Ned are sound 
asleep, and all right. Mrs. One is relieved yet worried 
about the whole situation. It is now getting light, 
she dresses while her husband builds the furnace fire. 
“Heavens but my face feels dirty: And there’s no 


_— 


water,” she says to herself. Hearing her husband on 
the first floor, she calls down: “Will you please light 
the gas and put the oat-meal on? It wasn’t nearly 
done, last night.” 


She hears him strike the match, then he swears. 
She half-smiles, she knows he is rather upset. A 
minute later she goes down-stairs to the kitchen, where 
she finds Norm fooling with the gas-stove. “It doesn’t 
light, Louise. I’ve tried ’em all, even the oven.” 


“That’s odd, dear, that all these misfortunes 
should descend upon us at once. I’m going to call 
Mary Ruyle and ask her if she’s having all this trouble. 
She’ll be up now.” 

“Yes, John goes to the city on the same interurban 
that I do.” Mrs. One is now at the telephone. She 
takes down the receiver and listens a moment. “Norm, 
this line is dead! It hasn’t even that ‘telephone buzz’ 
that shows that it is alive!’”’ Mr. One listens a minute 
then agrees with his wife. Both are puzzled as to what 
this means. ; 


“Well, Norm, we’ll have to eat what is in the cup- 
board. I can’t cook. You go and wake the boys, while 
I get out the cold potatoes.” He goes up-stairs, then 
in a few minutes his wife hears him returning to the 
kitchen. “Louise, you’d better go up and see what is 
the matter with Billy. He has fever. Suppose he took 
cold skating yesterday. He got awfully hot.” But 
Mrs. one doesn’t hear him. She is hurrying up the 
stairs. 


“Norman (she never calls 
her husband that unless she is 
angry or frightened) you call 
Dr. Wilson. I’m afraid Billy is 
awfully sick. I’ve gotten Ned out of there and opened 
the windows. Light the fire and heat the goose-grease. 
It’s up in the top of the east cup-board.” 

“Louise, you know the telephone and the gas are 
gone! I'll go down to the station and send a telegram. 
Dr Wilson is some ten miles from here.’ He grabs 
his hat and hurries out. 

Arriving at the station, he goes up to the operator 
and asks for a telegram blank. ‘No juice, Mr. One. 
Sorry. Is it anything serious?” 

“Then I’ll have to get that 8:03 to the city! Let’s 
see what time it is.’ He tugs impatiently at his watch. 

“No use, Mr. One. The cars aren’t running. 
There’s no juice, I told you.” 

* * * 


DOCTOR COULD 
NOT BE 
REACHED 


There’s an old proverb—“You never miss the 
water ’till the well runs dry.’”? And that proverb could 
be applied very nicely to the public utility of today. 
We take it too much for granted, just as we do every 
other good gift that we are accustomed to; health, 
wealth and friends, for instance; but all that needs to 
be done to have us truly appreciate these things that 
we have to be thankful for, is to have them taken 
away from us. 


Community Prosperity and The Utilities 


By Mae J. Anderson, Wheaton, III. 


It has been truly said that America is the land of 
prosperity. And this present prosperity is largely but 
the outgrowth of the cooperation between the public 
and the public utilities. 

The general term “public utility” or public service 
corporation embraces all property devoted to a public 


use and in which the public has an interest. It includes - 


the street railways, steam railways and their terminals, 
electricity, gas, telegraph, telephone, water supply and 
wireless agencies serving the public. The extent to 
which the vast commercial and manufacturing transac- 
tions of our nation are dependent upon the continual 
development and the able management of such public 
service corporations is not fully understood or appreci- 
ated by the general public. 


Picture if you will a community which by accident 
or misfortune lacks the service of the public utilities. 
The unpaved streets are dark or maybe here and there 
a coal oil lamp may chance to burn. Water is carried 
from the well and the meals are prepared on the old- 
fashioned cook stove. The life of this community is 
fully twenty-five years behind the present day material 
development. 

As the density of the population increases, stand- 
ards of living become higher and our daily life becomes 
less individualistic and more complex. Consequently, 
many services performed in the past by the individual 
are now being rendered collectively for the community 
by a utility, and this tendency will increase more and 
more in the future, for utility servics are the develop- 
ers and conservers of our civilization and Western 
ee oreten viewed sociologically is ever on the upward 

rend. 


UTILITIES 
DEVELOPERS 
OF CIVILIZATION 


The public service enter- 
prises of the United States have 
been and always will be one of 
the greatest factors in the de- 
velopment of the country. There are still vast areas 
which require the services of such companies, and al- 


ready served communities require continual extensions 
to the operations of their public utility corporations. 
Opportunities are continually presenting themselves 
and there is a great demand for further extensions of 
service by these corporations. 

But before further extensions can be made there 
must be just cooperation between the public and the 
utilities, for “no utility can be permanently prosperous 
or can foster the development of the country without 
the whole-hearted cooperation of the public. A clear 
comprehension of the reciprocal duties will lessen con- 
troversies and retaliatory actions, consequently foster- 
ing a cooperative spirit which will inevitably aid in 
the progress of the community and the state. 

Back of every public service corporation there 
are three fundamental elements. They are the inven- 
tors, the investors and individual brains. The inven- 
tors are those geniuses like Edison who have made 
possible all these great modern accomplishments which 
mean service and comfort to the public. Electric light, 
heat, power, transportation and communication are al- 
most entirely the product of the inventor’s work for 
the last twenty-five years. 


INVENTORS The investors, the second 
PROMOTERS element contained in _ utility 
INVESTORS service, are the people of the 
UNBREAKABLE state who have purchased stocks 
CHAIN and bonds with the expectation 


that their invested capital will 
earn a fair return for them and help supply service 
to the community. 

The other element is individual brains and is per- 
sonified in the man who furnishes ideas, time and ex- 
perience to further the development of the community 
needs. These three elements of service are dependent 
one upon the other and are linked together in an un- 
breakable chain. Were it not for the geniuses who 
made possible all these great inventions such as the 
telephone, telegraph, street car and countless others, 
America would still be wallowing in the civilization of 


TT 


yet 


2. nies 9 ae 





centuries ago and the modern communities of today 
would not be in existence. 


Were it not for the capital of the investor the 
promoter or the man with the ‘‘idea”’ would not find it 
possible to carry out his plans of organizing companies 
which give service to the public. All three are indis- 


pensable to one another. If any one of them were to 
decrease its contributions of service the community 


would immediately lag and consequently the pros- 
perity of the nation would be considerably lessened. 

The public; service enterprises of the United 
States of America have been one of the greatest 
factors in the development of this country and as the 
wheels of time speed on, fair-minded and progressive 
people will begin to realize more and more how the 
community and the state depends upon these enter- 
prises for prosperity. 


The Twentieth Century Miracle--The Utilities 


By Tierra Farrow, Urbana, Illinois. 


The greatest miracle of the twentieth century 
has been wrought by the service of the public utili- 
ties. Less than half a century ago we were living 
in the electric lightless, gasless, telephoneless, tele- 
graphless, street carless age. 


Today we press a button and a bright light in- 
stantly floods the house. Our neighbor picks up a 
telephone receiver and San Francisco or New York 
immediately answers his call. We turn a lever and 
our gas is ready for heating or cooking. We board 
a street car in the early morning and are whisked 
away to the office or factory. 


Mr. Business man wishes to talk with London or 
China—within a few minutes his message is flying 
through the air without the aid of a wire, or through 
cables under the ocean. Great engines in great in- 
dustries, having the force of thousandgy of horse 
power start the wheels of the machines in motion 
that give employment to thousands by the mere push- 
ing of a switch. 


These services are at our command so easily. and 
so cheaply that we never stop to think what would 
happen if, for some reason, the telephones, street 
cars, electric lights, gas or any other public utilities 
should suddenly cease to function. 


The history of the utilities is an interesting one, 
woven, as it is around the discoveries of our great 
men; Jeans Pierre Minkler, Samuel F. B. Morse, 
Thomas A. Edison, and Alexander G. Bell. 


GAS BIG The first record of gas be- 
FACTOR IN ing distilled from coal and used 
NATIONAL for lighting was at the Univers- 
PROSPERITY ity of Louvain, when, in 1774, 


Jeans Pierre Minkler used it to 
light his lecture room. Several early chemists made 
reports on the discovery of the properties of natural 
gas and the products of coal distillation, but the dis- 
covery of its commercial value was the result of the 
work of William Murdock of England, and Phillips Le 
Bon, of France. Today the annual production of gas 
in the United States is about eight hundred billion 
cubic feet, the gas traveling through 70,000 miles of 
mains, serving a population of nearly fifty-five mil- 
lions of people with fuel and light. Gas is only just 
beginning to come into its own as an important factor 
in the conservation of natural resources whereby the 
energy stored in coal is more fully utilized by convert- 
ing it into gas and coke instead of burning straight 
coal to produce energy. 


The first experiments towards establishing a sys- 
tem of telegraphing were begun toward the close of the 
eighteenth century. In 1753 a writer for Scots Ma- 
gazine detailed a method by which any message might 
be spelled out. His plan was to provide between two 
points a wire, insulated throughout its length, for each 
letter of the alphabet, and to spell out the message by 


means of indicators that would be operated at the re- 
ceiving end by frictional electricity. 

From that time on scientists everywhere began 
most exhaustive studies of the possibilities of electrical 
transmission of intelligence. Samuel F. B. Morse be- 
came a leader in this work and made a successful dem- 
onstration in 1844, which proved the nucleus of the 
Western Union Telegraph Company, which was organ- 
ized in 1851. 


To Thomas A. Edison clearly belongs the credit 
of creating the modern electric central station system 
for light and power. In the winter of 1880-1881 Mr. 
Edison installed a central-station system at Menlo 
Park, N. J., for the purpose of demonstrating the suc- - 
cess of what was popularly called the subdivision of 
the electric light. : 


ELECTRICITY Wonderful has been the 
A WONDER accomplishment of applied elec- 
WORKER tricity since then. It has 


brought light and cheer to the 
depressed, strength to the weak and relief to the 
weary. It is found in the home, the office, the hospital, 
the laboratory, the workshop, the factory, the rolling 


- mill, the mine, the store, on the farm, in transporting 


food and supplies across the country—practically 
everywhere that heat, light and power are required... 


Next came the telephone. The first instrument 
was a sort of crude harmonica with a clock-spring reed, 
a magnet and a wire. Capitalists laughed at it and re- 
fused several years to finance the “scientific toy.” In 
March 1876, Alexander G. Bell sent through a crude 
telephone, his own invention, the first spoken words 
ever carried over a wire, and the words were heard and 
understood by his associate, Thomas A. Watson, who 
was at the receiver less than 100 feet away. 


In January, 1915, the same Mr. Bell, sitting with 
the transmitter of a telephone to his lips, talked to the 
same Mr. Watson in San Francisco over a wire stretch- 
ing 3,400 miles across the continent and part of a 
system that includes 13,000,000 telephones, connected 
by 21,000,000 miles of wire. 


Today the telephone systems in America have 
strung enough wire to go around the earth 1,400 
times, or 35,000,000 miles of wire; they have placed 
one telephone for every seven persons in the country; 
over these systems more than twenty-one billion calls 
are made in one year—over ten times the number of 
people on earth. +3 

Utility services are the outgrowth, developers, 
and conservers of our civilization and form an insepar- 
able part of our daily life. As the density of popula- 
tion increases, standards of life become higher and our 
daily life more complex. More and more services, per- 
formed in the past by the individuals, are now rendered 
collectively for the community by a utility, and this 
tendency will increase year after year. 


